Pope’s synod document on family due 8 April

The Vatican announced on Thursday that Pope Francis’ much anticipated post-synodal document on the family will be published on 8 April.

The Apostolic Exhortation ‘Amoris Laetitia’ meaning ‘The Joy of Love’ will be released at a press conference on Friday morning.

It will be unveiled by Cardinal Lorenzo Baldisseri, general secretary of the Synod of Bishops, and Cardinal Christoph Schönborn, archbishop of Vienna.

Italian couple, Professor Francesco Miano, lecturer in moral philosophy at Rome’s University of Tor Vergata, and his wife, Professor Giuseppina De Simone Miano, lecturer in philosophy at the Theological Faculty of Southern Italy in Naples, will be part of the Vatican’s press conference panel.

The Apostolic Exhortation is the conclusion of a two-year synod process discussing both the beauty and challenges of family life today.

In 2014, the Vatican hosted an Extraordinary Synod which was in preparation for the October 2015 Ordinary Synod. An estimated 190 bishops from around the world participated in each gathering.

The 2015 Synod’s theme was ‘the vocation and mission of the family in the Church and the modern world.’

The document is expected to sum up the debates and decisions of the synods and may make new decisions concerning the church’s pastoral practices on communion for the divorced and remarried.

Some reports have suggested that the Apostolic Exhortation maybe as long as 200 pages.

Pope Francis is believed to have formally signed the document on 19 March, the feast day of St Joseph.